Lanarkshire family trying to raise £250k to send four-year-old boy with rare form of cancer to America for vaccine trial

dailyrecord.co.uk:

The Lanarkshire family of a brave four-year-old boy battling a rare form of cancer are trying to raise £250,000 to send him to America to get him on a vaccine trial that would decrease the chances of his illness relapsing.

Young Calum Rae was diagnosed with stage M high-risk Neuroblastoma, an aggressive cancer with a high chance of reoccurrence which only 100 kids a year in the UK suffer from, on March 1 after initial chickenpox symptoms failed to clear up.Calum has had eight cycles of chemo since then and his parents, Victoria MacDonald, 33, and Andrew Rae, 35, are now fundraising to send their son to a vaccine trial at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Centre in New York.The Lanarkshire Live app is available to download now.

Get all the news from your area – as well as features, entertainment, sport and the latest on Lanarkshire’s recovery from the coronavirus pandemic – straight to your fingertips, 24/7.The free download features the latest breaking news and exclusive stories, and allows you to customise your page to the sections that matter most to you.Head to the App Store and never miss a beat in Lanarkshire - iOS - Android The vaccine hopes to train the immune system to identify and destroy neuroblastoma cells and costs £250,000 as it involves seven trips to New York in a year.So far, the family’s fundraising campaign has collected nearly £50,000.

Although Calum and his parents now live in Troon, his dad Andrew is from Airdrie and the family used to stay in the town, while other loved ones and friends still living in Airdrie are doing their bit to get the youngster to the States.